Department of Economic History, Lund University
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
2025-10-09
A global socio-technical regime can thus be defined as the dominant institutional rationality in a socio-technical system, which depicts a structural pattern between actors, institutions and technologies that has reached validity beyond specific territorial contexts, and which is diffused through internationalized networks (Fuenfschilling & Binz, 2018, p. 739)
These regimes differ in their strength: How similar are they across different geographical scales?
How strong is the global regime for pulp and paper?
Scale at which institutional rationalities develop?
Key actors and their relationships?
Conflicts and resolutions between global rationalities and local context?
Channel of transformation: Actors, Networks, Technologies, Institutions?
Primary Data on Pulp and Paper Production
Narrative Literature Review
Research publications, books, and gray literature
Informs analysis of strength of global regime
Case Studies
| Sweden | Chile |
|---|---|
| Technology Exporter | Technology Importer |
| Traditional Forestry Country | New Forestry Actor |
| Boreal Forest | Temperate Forests |
| 🌲 Picea abies, Pinus Sylvestris | 🌲 Pinus radiata, 🌳 Ecualyptus |
Data Sources: Interviews, Case Studies, Financial and Strategy Documents
Informs sub-questions about global regime actors, effects and trends for countries
High international integration of Nordic forests since 18th century (Lehtinen et al., 2016)
Nordic countries emerge as key technology producers in 20th century
Forestry
Pulp and Paper Mills
Developments tightly connected to global economic demands, e.g. industrial revolution, demise of office paper and shipping boom (Beland Lindahl & Westholm, 2011)
Individual technological systems exposed to firm-level heterogenity, e.g. pulping process in Swedish pulp mills (Ottosson & Magnusson, 2013; Soderholm & Soderholm, 2020)
Technology key in transporting rationalities (Tahvanainen et al., 2024)
Education mostly Global North based (Fuentealba et al., 2021; Manuschevich, 2016)
Sociotechnical system of pulp and paper production strongly globalized
Shared rationales about capital intensive, high-tech, automated and mechanized processes, developed in Global North and located with few actors
But space for local experimentation down to firm-level